It Was Never Love to Begin With

My body matured faster than most girls my age.

When I turned 18, my overprotective brother worried I’d be taken advantage of, so he asked his best friend to look after me.

But the first time we met, that man's eyes never left my body.

After I graduated from college, he kept crossing the line, again and again.

By day, he was my boss, and by night, I was his "personal assistant."

For four years, we kept our affair a secret.

He molded me into exactly what he liked, and the worst part? I let him.

One day, his ex-fiancée came back from overseas. He slipped out of my bed in the middle of the night and rushed to the airport to pick her up.

Humiliated but unwilling to let go, I followed him there, only to watch him gently stroke another woman’s hair right in front of me.

He turned to me and said, "Jennifer Huckabee, four years ago, you were the one who crawled into my bed while I was drunk. The way you're behaving now… it’s really pathetic."

The way he looked at her was soft, and the way he mocked me was sharp and deliberate.

I suddenly realized he was right. This was meaningless.

So I lowered my head, texted my brother to tell him I’d accept the Sinclair family marriage proposal, then looked up at that man and smiled.

"Alright then. Goodbye."

Marvin Huckabee, my brother, called not long after.

I could hear the relief in his voice through the call, surely because he thought I had finally let go of the man I had loved for years.

What he did not know was that the man I was madly in love with…was his best friend, Devin Woodford.

After hanging up, I picked up the resignation letter I already prepared and headed for HR. However, the process stalled at the final step.

"Ms. Huckabee, if you want to resign within a week, you'll need the CEO's signature for approval."

Devin again. Even at the very end, I still could not avoid him.

I tightened my grip on my phone, walked to the end of the empty hallway, and dialed that all-too-familiar number.

The ringing went on for a long time.

Just as I thought no one would pick up, the line clicked. A strange female voice came through.

"Hello? Looking for Devin? He's in the shower…"

In the shower…

Those three words stabbed my chest like a thousand poisoned needles. Nonetheless, my voice stayed calm, almost unnaturally so.

"No need, thank you."

Before she could say anything else, I hung up. The screen went dark, reflecting my pale face.

Less than two minutes later, my phone buzzed violently again. I stared at Devin's name on the screen for several seconds before answering.

"Did you need something?"

His tone was businesslike: cold and detached. Just last night, this same man had been on top of me, whispering my name intimately over and over again.

My fingers